Global Life Cycle Assessment

International Copper Association Global Life Cycle Assessment Manfred Russ

John Jewell

Oct 2011, Chicago

Global Copper Cathode LCA Copper association needs and benefits

International Copper Association (ICA) desired outcomes: Respond to market demand for life cycle information Provide robust data to stakeholders making material choices and the LCA community at large Harmonize copper industry’s efforts with other metal industry LCI work

Benefits to the ICA: Better understanding of the environmental performance Promotion of continuous improvement Response to customer requests for environmental information Foundation to build “cradle-to-grave” profiles of copper-containing products Benchmark for ICA members

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LCA methodology for Copper LCA Scope of study

Goals Creation of recent, high quality LCI for primary copper cathode at refinery gate Results will be disclosed to the public as aggregated LCIs for public and commercial databases No comparative assertions are disclosed to the public

Scope “cradle-to-gate� life cycle inventory Geographical scope: global Technological scope: pyrometallurgical route / hydrometallurgical route Temporal scope: reference period 2005-2009

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Summary of Participants Overview

10 companies with 35 sites involved

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Summary of Participants Representativeness

Global primary cathode production – 15.3 thousand tonnes Pyro – 12.3 k-tonnes Hydro – 3 k-tonnes ICA study – 4.3 thousand tonnes 29% of Global Pyro – 3.3 k-tonnes production Hydro – 1 k-tonne Missing countries / regions with significant production: China Russia India Indonesia Zambia Missing countries had an accumulated annual production volume in 2007 of 4,650 ktonne, so their share on worldwide primary copper cathode production sums up to 30%

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LCA methodology for Copper LCA Function and functional unit

Function The system function is the production of primary copper cathode at the factory gate (minimum 99.99% purity level) Generation of valuable co-products from the copper production system have been eliminated using allocation or avoided burden via system expansion

Functional unit Main functional unit

1000 kg of primary copper cathode at the factory gate Intermediate functional unit

1000 kg of copper concentrate at the factory gate (29.6% copper content, based on the weighted average of the participants)

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LCA methodology for Copper LCA System boundaries

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LCA methodology for Copper LCA Treatment of co-products – co-products in the copper production system

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Data and Modelling Data limitations

Limitations of the study Topics to be evaluated in more detail as the science is available: Water footprint Land use Biodiversity

Data needs for further elaboration and special focus in the future: Use/treatment of waste Tailings Waste rock / Overburden Toxicity Metals in air and water Related Impact categories (e.g. terrestric ecotoxicity, aquatic ecotoxicity, human toxicity)

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LCA results – Copper Cathode Impact assessment (CML 2001) split by scope

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LCA results – Copper Cathode Pyro route breakdown

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LCA results – Copper Cathode Hydro route breakdown

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LCA results – Copper Cathode Sensitivity Analyses

Sensitivity analyses: Sulphuric acid – Market value vs. System expansion Treatment of ore, concentrate and metal co-products with different approaches

Sensitivity on the results based on the share of the pyro- and hydro-route

The choice of H2SO4 treatment as co-product has the largest effect on results.

The other sensitivity analyses have no relevant influence on the overall results.

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Conclusions

Dominant production stage: Mining and Concentrate production are dominant contributors for PED, GWP, EP Smelting and Refining are dominant for AP, POCP, ODP

Electricity grid mixes: Grid mix is a significant contributor for all impacts Differences between the applied grid mixes (Chile, Argentina, Mexico, US, Europe, Australia, Japan) are considerable.

Co-product – sulphuric acid: Credit given to Pyro smelters producing surplus H2SO4 based on avoided virgin acid production.

H2SO4 input to the hydro process is environmental burden free.

Choice of treatment method (system expansion vs. credit for avoided production) is significant

Copper scrap: Production of primary copper cathode includes copper scrap (secondary raw material).

This results in reduced concentrate consumption is reduced along with those burdens.

Secondary copper is useful as cooling scrap but is limited by availability of scrap

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Questions?

Manfred Russ – m.russ@pe-international.com John Jewell – j.jewell@pe-international.com